The Girl Who'd Screamed 'Someone Grab Him'
by Lunamionny
Summary: In the months following the end of the war, the events of Hogwarts' Halloween festivities lead Neville to see Pansy Parkinson in a new light. A Neville/Pansy tale of new perspectives and redemption, of healing and hope.


A/N:

Written for the Slytherin Cable's Wicked Witches Halloween fest.

Huuuge love and thanks to Frumpologist and IKEAwhatyoudidthere for their superb alpha and beta help.

* * *

__'Then a figure rose from the Slytherin table and he recognised Pansy Parkinson as she raised a shaking arm and screamed, "But he's there! Potter's there! Someone grab him!"' - __Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

"I want the best, Longbottom."

Neville looked up in alarm from where he was working alone in Greenhouse Three to see Pansy Parkinson sauntering down the aisle between the workbenches towards him. Her hips swayed magically as she did so, until she came to a stop next to him and rested her perfect arse against the bench.

"I - what?" he stuttered.

"The best," Pansy purred softly. "The biggest. The juiciest. The tastiest. And I heard that you're the man that has it."

Pansy's lips were blood red. Blood red and beautiful, and Neville couldn't stop looking at them.

"Me? I've got the biggest, juiciest - to - me - heard?"

Neville was well aware he hadn't uttered enough of the right words, let alone said them in the correct order. But lately, Pansy Parkinson always seemed to have this effect on him - made his brain melt into incoherent mush. Her gaze wandered up and down his body and her lips quirked up into a smile, as if she knew she had reduced him to a stuttering mess and was mildly amused by it.

"__Pumpkins __, Longbottom," she breathed, making the ubiquitous fruit sound so filthy Neville's cock twitched. "I heard you're growing the best pumpkins for All Hallows' Eve. And I need the best. For the Carving Competition and the Food and Drink Festival."

"Oh." Understanding dawned, which was something at least. Neville could now try and get a handle on this conversation.

Pansy stepped closer to him and he swivelled as she did, so his back came up against the bench behind him. She didn't halt in her advance and stopped only an inch or so from him.

"So, you think you can give me the best?"

__Yes, yes, of course he could, he'd give her anything. He really would __. Neville shook his head, trying to clear it.

"What - why are you entering the pumpkin comps? I'd have thought they were a bit - a bit young for you?" Neville chose his words carefully, for fear of insulting the unpredictable and volatile witch.

Every year on Halloween, Hogwarts held a competition, with various prizes for the most creatively carved pumpkin, and a food and drink competition, in which all manner of food and drink, as long as it had pumpkin as a main ingredient, could be entered. It was only the younger years that took it seriously; most older students didn't even bother entering.

Pansy smirked, and Neville noticed that she even looked delectable doing that.

"After all the shit that happened last year," Pansy waved her hand, indicating the Second Wizarding War in one impatient, dismissive gesture. "My parents said I have to show __willing, __" – the last word was spat out in disgust – "So here I am, entering a pissing pumpkin competition, yes, and I need you to make this whole charade easier by giving me the __best __."

"But – if you don't care about the comp, why do you care about having a good pumpkin?"

Pansy let out a derisive little laugh, as if Neville's question were quite ridiculous.

"Because, Longbottom." Her eyes glinted darkly. "No matter how pathetic this competition is, I __still __have to win. Winning is what I do." Her finger jabbed at his chest and the feel of the contact sent a jolt to his cock.

"Um...er...well...it's kind of first come, first serve. With the pumpkins," Neville garbled. "They should be ready in about a week...first come, first serve..."

"Hmm," Pansy huffed, and tilted her head, as if appraising him. Then she reached out and, in an act that confused Neville further, started to rearrange his tie, which had come awry during the last hour that Neville had been scrabbling about in the greenhouse. "Well, maybe I'll just have to __come __first?" Her voice was sultry and dripping with suggestion. "Would you like that, Neville, if I... __came __first?"

Neville's mouth had gone dry and his mind had totally failed him for there were no words there, just an image - all he could imagine was Pansy's face contorted in ecstasy and her body shuddering and shaking as he made her come with his fingers, right there, up against the greenhouse benches. He felt a bulge growing in his trousers – __oh God – not here, for fuck's sake, not now __–

"What's that?" Pansy scowled as she glared over Neville's shoulder at the plant he'd been tending before she walked in. "Is that __cannabis sativa __?"

Neville was so surprised she knew the correct Latin name for the __specific __cannabis species sat on the workbench, he found his words again.

"Yes." Well, one word. And a stupid one given the context, given how much he'd just given away to her. __Balls __.

"Well, well, well." Pansy moved away from him to peer at the plant more closely. "Neville Longbottom, growing cannabis right under Sprout's nose." She huffed a laugh, almost like a giggle, and it was delightful. Neville wanted to hear it again. "You naughty little boy."

Neville's dick stirred again at her words. __Motherfucking Merlin, behave, __he silently admonished the wayward appendage.

"I – it's just – for research purposes."

"Sure," Pansy said, sounding completely unconvinced. "And that's why supplies have been so much easier to come by this year, I'm guessing? Don't worry, I'll keep your secret. As long as I get a cut."

"I – could give you a discount on some product?"

"No. I want a cut of the profits."

Neville sighed, resigned to the fact there was probably no way out of this mess now. "Two percent," he offered.

Pansy scoffed. "Ten," she bargained.

"Five."

"Fine"

"Fine."

Pansy held out her hand and Neville's thoughts seemed to disintegrate again as his hand clasped around Pansy's soft palm, and her beautifully manicured nails and –

"So. I'll __come __back in a week. For the pumpkin," she said softly.

"Right."

There was a pause. Neville had the distinct impression Pansy was waiting for something before she left, but he had no idea what.

"Longbottom. You're still holding my hand?" Pansy explained, her lips curling up into an amused half-smile.

"Oh. Right," he stammered, and abruptly released Pansy's hand as if it had just stung him.

She gave a little nod before she turned and sauntered away again, calling behind her, "And remember, Longbottom, only the best..."

* * *

For the subsequent hour that Neville was in the greenhouse, tending his cannabis plants, he scolded himself. He - and his dick - should not be reacting in such ways to Pansy Parkinson, and he mentally listed the reasons why.

Pansy Parkinson bled green and silver. Her blood was the purest of pure, which wasn't itself a problem - he himself was a pureblood. The problem was that her family thought blood status mattered, and assumed they were superior just because of it. Pansy Parkinson had a sharp tongue which, over the years, had no doubt sliced deeper wounds than Harry's lightning-bolt scar.

"No more," Neville told Trevor who was poking his head out the pocket of his robes. "No more falling for Pansy Parkinson." The toad croaked, as if unconvinced. "Yes, I know there was that time at the beginning of summer term..."

Neville paused in his pruning as he remembered what he was referring to. Pansy, with a sneer and then a smirk, had pushed past him as they'd both left a Dark Arts lesson. Later, he had found a piece of parchment in his bag, giving off Pansy's unique rose scent, and a Revelio charm had revealed a missive scrawled in feminine hand: __They're after your Grandmother, Longbottom. Better watch your back. It's probably time you disappeared too. __

It could have been read as a friendly warning or a malicious threat, but either way, it had meant he'd got safely to the Room of Requirement just as the Death Eaters had entered the school with orders to take him away.

"That doesn't mean much...does it?" he asked Trevor now, who blinked his wide eyes at him in response.

For years, Pansy Parkinson had walked the halls of Hogwarts with an upturned nose and disdain in her eyes. Except for last year, Neville conceded, when her eyes were more guarded and expression unreadable; she had worn the badge of the Inquisitorial Squad, although had not seemed to wear it proudly.

He had seen the way her hand had shook as they were forced to perform dark curses; he had heard his classmates mumble how "Parkinson's Crucios are nowhere near as bad as some of the others..." __You have to really mean it __, they kept being told, and it seemed that maybe Pansy hadn't...

Still, ultimately, it all came down to one inescapable fact: Pansy Parkinson was The Girl Who'd Screamed 'Someone Grab Him'. She had tried to offer up Harry on a silver and green platter. Neville reminded himself that, although someone had a beautiful face, it did not make them kind of heart.

Despite these mental ruminations, though, a week later, when it came to picking pumpkins, Neville carefully selected one with the best consistency for carving, that was just ripe enough to mean that whatever food or drink someone would make from it, it would be the tastiest.

He selected the best, and put it aside ready for when Pansy Parkinson came to collect it.

* * *

Pansy won second prize in the Carving Competition, and first in the Food and Drink Festival. Neville watched her closely as the results were read out. He saw how her lips twitched momentarily but, aside from that, there was nothing that told him how the girl felt about her awards.

Later in the evening, the older students assembled around the huge bonfire that was lit every Halloween in the ground of Hogwarts. Neville's eyes continued to follow Pansy all night, despite the promise he'd made to himself to try and fall out of – lust? – or whatever it was with Pansy Parkinson.

He watched as she politely took a glass of Luna's pumpkin punch, drank a sip, feigned a 'that's nice' face and then, when Luna's back was turned, promptly tipped it into a nearby plant pot. He observed her as she took several large gulps of butterbeer and Daphne Greengrass came and whispered something in her ear, which made her tilt her head back and laugh, the fire making shadows dance across her face. He looked on with a twisted feeling in his gut as Pansy flirted with Blaise Zabini. Neville's grip tightened around the hold of his beer as she let Zabini lean in, ever so close to her, and she smiled a smile that seemed to be just for him.

"There's no need to be so upset, Neville," a dreamy voice said to his immediate left. He turned to see Luna standing next to him.

"What – what do you mean?"

Luna smiled innocently and nodded to Pansy and Zabini. "They're just friends. I'm fairly sure of it. Blaise is gay, you see. So you don't need to be jealous of him."

"I – what – what do you mean?"

"Well, I thought you were upset because you like Pansy, and Zabini seemed to be flirting with her."

"How – what –" But Neville stopped himself, because Luna was one of his best friends, as well as one of the most uncannily perceptive people he knew. There was no point in denying his feelings to her. He signed resignedly, shaking his head. "It's awful, isn't it?"

"What?"

"That I like Pansy Parkinson. Out of all the people, I've decided to fall for the Wicked Witch of Slytherin House." As he spoke, he kept on eye on said wicked witch across the bonfire as Blaise left her and Terry Boot approached her.

"Evil is a strong, powerful word Neville. I don't think it fits Pansy Parkinson," Luna said solemnly.

"She offered up Harry to Voldemort," Neville objected as Terry, who seemed to be swaying slightly, said something to Pansy. Neville was too far away to hear what, but he watched as her face morphed into an expression he hadn't seen before: vulnerable, unguarded. She looked...hurt, upset.

"In exchange for what, Neville? A hundred souls were in that hall, including her childhood friends and her boyfriend at the time. People she loved. My father was willing to give up only three souls in exchange for me. Funny, how people don't keep condemning him for that." Luna said in a lilting, contemplative voice. Her words made Neville turn his head to look at his friend properly.

"She – she's mean. Was mean." Neville corrected himself, for the venom that Pansy Parkinson had spat in her earlier years at Hogwarts had seemed to have dried up when they'd all returned for their 'eighth year'.

"It's hard to know whether people are truly mean, or just afraid. Fear makes people cruel, you see."

As Neville let Luna's words sink in, he turned back to Pansy, but she was gone from the place she'd been standing. His eyes raked the students milling around the bonfire, but he couldn't see her anywhere.

"Where do you think she's gone?" He tried, but failed, to hide the urgency in his voice.

"Maybe you should find out," a new voice said, brisker and firmer than Luna's. Ginny had come and stood on his other side.

"Huh?"

"Maybe you should go and find out where Parkinson's gone," Ginny explained. "I mean, I still don't like the girl, and I don't understand what you see in her, but you should know by now that life is too short to dither around, Nev. Go and find her – jump her bones, declare your love, whatever you feel you need to do."

"Love? God no, I don't love – I mean, I can't, she's beautiful – I'm not –"

Ginny turned a pair of ominously blazing eyes on him. "__Please __don't say you're not good enough for her."

"Well, it's just –"

"Neville. What were we doing this time last year?

Neville was taken aback by the unexpected question, but answered it nonetheless. "Stealing the Sword of Gryffindor. Well, attempting to steal it and failing spectacularly."

"Exactly. We snuck into a Death Eater's office to steal a coveted magical artefact, whilst fighting a brutal totalitarian regime. And you don't think you're good enough for Pansy-pissing-Parkinson?!"

Neville waited. He could tell Ginny hadn't finished yet. That, in fact, she was only getting started, gearing up into one of her impressive rants. He waited with a mixture of apprehension and intrigue – Ginny's tirades, especially when drunk, were rather magnificent.

"Neville, you lobbed the head off a massive fucking snake?! A snake with a broken piece of a dark wizard's soul in it! You were the __only __one - when they brought Harry's body back and we thought he was dead, we all thought that was it - you were the __only __one that didn't let it beat you. You stepped forward and faced off the darkest fucking wizard of all time!" Ginny gesticulated wildly, causing the drink in her hand, which looked suspiciously like Luna's pumpkin punch, to slosh over the side of her glass.

"He set fire to a hat on your fucking __head __, Neville! And you braved it and survived it __all __, but Pansy Parkinson can still get you tongue-tied?" Ginny took a deep breath, then continued more gently. "Nev, what I'm saying is, you're a fucking __catch __. Like I said, I don't know what you see in her, but if you really want her, go after her. Believe me, I waited far too long to go after what I wanted. Life's too short. You should know that by now."

"I think she's right," Luna said softly. She'd been standing by his side, listening silently for the duration of Ginny's monologue.

"Right. Yes. Right. Thanks Gin. Thanks Luna. I – right," Neville said.

Cementing his resolve, he squared his shoulders and walked off in search of Pansy Parkinson, with his best friends' words ringing comfortingly in his ears.

* * *

He found her sat on a stone bench in an alcove off one of the outer courtyards. Her eyes were gazing out as if unseeing to the phoenix fountain that had been erected in honour of Dumbledore's memory.

To his confusion, there was water on her cheeks and, as Neville looked closer, he realised that, yes, the water was coming from her eyes. Had she got something in her eye – a piece of dust or something – in both her eyes?

Neville walked closer and, seemingly sensing his presence, Pansy looked up at him. She wrapped her coat tightly around her, and abruptly brushed her tears away.

"Did you get something in your eye – in both your eyes?" Neville asked weakly.

"Yeah, Longbottom. Smoke. From the fire," she answered sourly.

"Ah," he said, and stood over her, awkwardly, trying to decide what to do. Conjuring up the lion in him – the lion that had made him lob the head off a giant snake, as Ginny had put it – he sat down on the bench next to her. She just shifted uncomfortably.

"All Hallows' Eve," she said after a moment, not taking her eyes from the fountain. "You know what it really celebrates?"

"Erm – the dead?" Neville wished, not for the first time, that he could be more articulate.

"Hhm, yes. In particular, martyrs. The ones we're meant to revere. What about the ones who are not revered, Longbottom? Who mourns them?"

It occurred to Neville that maybe it wasn't the smoke that had caused Pansy's tears after all.

"Did Terry Boot say something to you – something that upset you?"

Pansy turned to him and gave him a melancholy smile. "Nothing much different to what I've heard all year. He slurred something about how Michael Corner had died in the battle. Said it should have been me instead of him. Or else I should be rotting in Azkaban, Death Eater's whore that I am."

Neville bristled at hearing Terry's words. He knew the Ravenclaw had been struggling with grief over Michael's death, but his words didn't seem fair

"That's – that was out of order."

Pansy shrugged and took a deep breath. "No matter what I try and do, how I try and show people I might be someone different, I'm only ever going to be known for the girl who shouted 'Someone grab him.'

"Why - why __did __you say that?" Neville asked softly. After his conversation with Luna, Neville couldn't help but wonder.

Pansy looked at him with an impenetrable gaze, before turning back to the fountain.

"I was scared. I think I've always been scared. When I first got to Hogwarts, I couldn't sleep properly because I thought the lake was going to come crashing in through the dormitory walls. I'd always been taught to hide my fear – to make others scared of me before they could take advantage of my own vulnerabilities. I was taught that kindness was a weakness and cruelty was a strength. Beauty and a sharp tongue, that's what my mother said I needed to get on in the world. And it's all I thought I had. I've never known how to be anything different. But I never stopped being scared. And that time in the Great Hall, before the battle, I was terrified. The words rushed out before I could stop them. I didn't want Potter to die, of course I didn't, but I didn't want so many others to die either. It was instinctive. Stupid. Selfish probably, too."

Neville thought of what Luna had said about her father. "That's not selfish. Or, if it is, it's the nature of love, isn't it?" Pansy didn't answer so Neville continued. "I've been scared too. Most of my life. I asked the hat to put me in Hufflepuff, you know. For years, I couldn't understand why I was in Gryffindor."

"But then you led an underground army against two Death Eaters, two people that kept most of the children of this school paralysed with fear. And killed a massive fucking snake."

Pansy turned to Neville and looked at him properly for the first time. Her eyes were surrounded by smudged makeup and glistening with tears, but she still looked beautiful. The moonlight reflected off her pale cheeks as she gazed deeply at him, as if searching for something behind his irises.

"You've blossomed, Longbottom, you know that? Like the flowers you grow, no doubt." Neville was grateful for the darkness of the night for hiding his blush. "You make things grow out of dirt...how do you do that?"

Neville wasn't quite sure what Pansy meant by her question, but on the subject of Herbology, words flowed from him easily. "Plants are like people. They may start off as nothing much at all but, with tending, nurturing and time, they can grow to the best they can be."

"What if they don't get tending and nurturing?"

"Then they can struggle...wilt..."

"And die?"

"I suppose so, yes. But – but – if a plant's been neglected, it can still thrive. If its environment changes, or it's given the right care."

Pansy's eyes glinted in the dark. She reached forward and stroked a finger down Neville's cheek, setting his heart stuttering. "Do you believe in redemption, Neville Longbottom?"

"I –" But he was so close to her now, and to those perfect, lovely lips, and Neville was leaning forward – and he thought she might have been too – and pressing his lips to hers, and he felt ecstatic relief and excitement at the feel of her kissing him back.

They stayed like that for some time – the boy who'd killed a giant snake and the girl who'd screamed 'Someone grab him' – under the moonlight and the stone gaze of the phoenix, as their kiss gently deepened.

__Do you believe in redemption? __ She'd asked him. And Neville very much thought he did.

* * *

A/N: Your thoughts/reviews/favs are cherished and treasured. Thank you.


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